KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 6 — Amid concern that the Lynas rare-earth plant in Kuantan could be threatened by the massive floods sweeping across Pahang, the company today said the site has escaped the deluge and was operating as usual.
In response to The Malay Mail Online’s query, Lynas Malaysia Sdn Bhd also said its refinery was built according to national and international regulations.
“The Lynas Plant located in Gebeng Industrial Estate is not affected by the massive floods in Kuantan and the Plant is operating as usual,” it wrote in a brief four-paragraph statement.
Yesterday, state news agency Bernama reported that over 38,000 people in Pahang have been evacuated from their homes due to severe flooding caused by heavy rain since last Sunday.
On Wednesday, Bernama reported that Kuantan was almost paralysed, with power and water supply cut off in most parts of the state capital, with the town and its surrounding areas recording flood levels of between one to two metres.
Today, Lynas also moved to allay fears that the waste stored in its residue storage facility (RSF) would leak into the ground due to the heavy downpour in Kuantan.
“The Residue Storage Facility (RSF) itself was designed to prevent any leaching to the ground and to the environment and has fulfilled all the national and international standards imposed.
“The Residue Storage Facilities were designed and constructed to provide sufficient capacity to contain stormwater caused by the worst flood that occurred in this area over the last one hundred years,” Lynas said.
Critics previously voiced concern that the plastic lining in the RSF would not be able to keep the waste from leaking out, reportedly claiming that it was too thin and insisted that the company identify a permanent disposal facility (PDF) site.
Lynas’s refinery process creates Water Leach Purification (WLP) as one of three by-products. It is radioactive, with a reading of six becquerel per gram.
On September 26, Bernama reported that Lynas was aiming to run its plant at full capacity by the end of this year, with the company expected to have positive returns after that.
According to Lynas’s managing director Datuk Mashal Ahmad, the plant is only carrying out production for customer certification tests and is running at 30 per cent of the 11,000 tonnes capacity of the refinery’s first phase.
After phase two has been commissioned, the plant’s capacity will double to 22,000 tonnes, with Lynas then able to meet 20 per cent of the world’s demand for the rare earth concentrates, Mashal reportedly said.
In the second quarter, which ended in June 30 this year, Lynas has produced 144 tonnes of rare earth concentrates at its plant and shipped 117 tonnes.
In October 31, the New Straits Times reported that the radiation level at Lynas’s RM2.5-billion plant in Kuantan was still within the level allowed locally and internationally.
Despite the company’s repeated assurances that its plant does not pose any safety hazards, local environmental activists continue to protest and insist that Lynas shuts down its Lynas Advanced Materials Plant (LAMP) in Kuantan.
On November 29, 16 Malaysian activists were joined by several Australian non-government organisations (NGOs) in a protest outside Australian miner Lynas Corporation’s shareholders meeting in Sydney.
Himpunan Hijau said 1.2 million Malaysians had by then signed its petition launched in August in their bid to close down the plant, with the activist group’s chairman Wong Tack saying on the same day that Lynas must pull out of the country by June 29 next year or face a massive street protest.
In September last year, the Malaysian regulator Atomic Energy Licensing Board granted Lynas (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd its TOL, which came with several conditions. AELB director-general Raja Datuk Abdul Aziz Raja Adnan had then said the TOL would be for a two-year period that would end on September 2, 2014.
On its website, Lynas said that it had on July 2 this year submitted its plans to recycle the waste for commercial purposes and its plans for a PDF, with AELB now reviewing the documents which Lynas was required to submit within 10 months of the issuance of the TOL.
